Blogs from Gili Air, Lombok, Indonesia, Asia - page 3

Arriving on Gili Air my main priority was to find a diving company, and book a dive for the morning. After visiting a few different dive shops I finally settled with the first, and arranged a dive for 8am. Turning up in the morning I discovered I was the only customer on the 8:30 dive, so it was to be just me and my instructor. The dive was at shark point, and despite there being no guarantee of seeing any sharks, my instructor soon found me a white tipped reef shark around 1m long hidden in some rocks. It was amazing to see my first shark, just a shame it didn't come for a swim so I could get a better view! After leaving the shark I also saw thousands of fish in their schools, and ... read more

The journey to Gili Air was really simple, the three Gili islands are so close together that there’s an island hopping boat service that takes you there. The journey took all of 20 minutes via Gili Meno. Although as always it took as about an hour to find out what time it left in the morning, after being told 5 different times! Before we made the short trip across top Gili Air we’d had a quick look on the internet for a few ideas on places to stay, it wasn’t really a surprise to find next to nothing so as soon as we arrived we headed off to find somewhere for to stay. We looked at 3 or 4 places before deciding on bungalow set about 50 yards from the beach, it was fairly basic but ... read more

Gili Air We arrive and straight away we like this island the best. Sandy track around the island again, accommodation on one side of the track and restaurants and bars along the beach front, but with a really chilled out vibe and ambiance. Less than Gili T but more than Gili Meno, so we stay for 7 days. The walk around the island mixes tourism with village life passing paddocks with cows, small fires burning off rubbish or cooking breakfast. The beach shacks and bars all have character with shells and coral for decoration and pretty laterns at night lighting up the sandy tracks past cabanas on the waters edge. Mainly couples and groups of single girls, we have spotted some older than us for a change! This island is the cheapest for food and drink, ... read more

The continuing quest for paradise… I have this vision of an unspoiled, tropical paradise – swaying palm trees, perfect blue skies and gentle ocean breezes, powdery white sand, and clear turquoise water. I’ve seen pictures of it on calendars, travel web sites, and airline posters. Therefore, it must exist. I will find it…. I’ve come close a few times. Hawaii is a paradise by any definition. I love Maui and always go when I have a chance, but it is a bit overdeveloped and crowded to be a true escape. Plus, in my mind, paradise does not have a K-Mart. Nothing I’ve seen comes closer to those ideal poster images than the Maldives. However, the lack of competition on each one-resort island suddenly inflates prices to four times their natural size. This stresses me more than ... read more

Na 3 dagen binnen besloot ik de kamer uit te gaan en richting de wifi te lopen aan de receptie. Na een halfuurtje internetten kwam ik een bekend gezicht tegen aan de receptie van ons hotel. De Nederlandse Sara! We hadden samen met haar op de bus en de boot gezeten richting de Gili eilanden. Ze had niet gedacht dat we nog op Gili Air gingen zijn, en toen ik vertelde dat ik ziek was geweest en dit de eerste dag was dat ik terug buiten zat verschoot ze haar een bult. Ze zei dat ze nog niemand had leren kennen van backpackers die , buiten haarzelf dan, ook ziek geweest waren voor een langere periode. Volgens haar had ik een darmparasiet of een darmbacterie. Ik hoop echt van niet. Mijn eetlust is nog steeds niet ... read more